Desperate Measures

April 1, 2011

Three parentless children strike out on their own in order to stay together. Thirteen-year-old Rhianna Davies and her twin are very different; Rhianna is taller, likes to swim and attends special classes at school. Vicky likes class hunk Matt, is 47 minutes older and is (according to Rhianna) quite bossy. The girls and their 10-year-old troublemaker brother Jamie have been in foster care since their mother died of cancer two years previously and their father went away to help refugees (according to Vicky). When their current foster mother has to go to hospital, well-meaning Mrs. Frankish, their social worker, determines to split them up in order to replace them. They decide to make a run for Great Auntie Irene's house in the country instead. The trip is difficult, especially once the authorities start looking for them, and the surprise at its end is not pleasant. They may have reached their planned destination, but their quest for a home is far from over. British author Summers' debut was well-received in her native land and is likely to be here as well. Vicky and Rhianna narrate alternating chapters, and both have realistic and distinctive voices. Their page-turning trek across the countryside sags a bit at the end, but readers will most definitely hang on to find out what happens in the credible and happy ending. (Fiction. 9-12)

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July 1, 2011

Gr 4-7-This debut novel, told in alternating chapters by 13-year-old twins, Vicky and Rhianna Davies, recounts the desperate measures three siblings take to keep from being split up by the foster care system. The sisters are very different, with Vicky looking after her learning disabled twin as well as her younger brother, Jamie, who has behavioral issues. When their mother's death puts their father on a course that ends with his imprisonment, the kids are placed with foster parents. A difficult pregnancy in that home means that they will be separated, and they decide to run away to an elderly aunt's cottage. They are able to elude authorities and some teen bullies, and all ends on a hopeful note. While the narrators' voices ring true, the plot is predictable and the secondary characters, especially the unsympathetic social workers, are stereotypical. This novel is reminiscent of Cynthia Voigt's Homecoming (Ballantine, 1983), with a similar plot, a strong female teenager as the leader, a feisty and obstreperous younger brother, and a sister in need of caretaking. Perhaps because Homecoming was written in the less dangerous time of the 1980s, the Tillermans' journey seems more believable. That the Davies children get as far as they do, with the help of adults who don't notify the police, seems harder to fathom. The book's real appeal lies in the well-developed, sympathetic character of Rhianna; through her, readers begin to understand issues around being learning disabled and different.-Connie Tyrrell Burns, Mahoney Middle School, South Portland, ME

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